Pierre Gadonneix, the chairman of the World Energy Council (WEC), described water and land use as a huge challenge at the recent closing ceremony of the World Energy Congress in Montreal, Canada.
“By 2025, 1.8-billion people will be living in countries or regions with absolute water scarcity,” Gadonneix said. ‘The energywater-food nexus is an important issue that will be addressed in WEC’s future work.”
The WEC report, “Water for Energy 2010”, notes that today, almost 14% of the world’s population lives in Africa, consuming not even 6% of the total freshwater annually.
African countries, on average, consume less water per capita than countries in other regions of the world. As a country progresses, such as in the case of Egypt, Libya, South Africa and Tunisia, the per capita amount of water withdrawn annually increases.
However, the report indicates that though Africa has a low share of the world’s total primary energy production (9% in 2005, estimated at 8% in 2050), the water used to produce and generate energy accounts for more than one-third of the water consumed in the energy sector worldwide.
“This is mainly due to a relatively high share, about 25%, of traditional biomass in Africa’s energy mix.”
Legislation and policy to ensure adequate water for energy are in place in South Africa and other more developed African countries, but the challenge lies in implementation and enforcement.
“To reduce the risk of water availability for energy, attention must therefore be paid to water use by agriculture (unlawful irrigation and inefficient water use), water conservation and demand management in the domestic sector, inefficient operation and maintenance of municipal sewerage plants resulting in water quality impacts, as well as the discharge of polluted mine water from old and existing coal and gold mines,” the WEC report says.
“Water is a critical resource for the world,” says Carlos Pone, chief executive of ABB South Africa. “ABB is committed to providing solutions to help manage its usage and treatment more effectively.”
ABB has a wide range of solutions for the water sector, including integrated and optimised instrumentation, control and electrical systems, as well as a range of power and automation products that improve the energy efficiency, productivity and reliability of the water network, desalination and treatment-plant assets.
ABB is involved in many innovative water solutions. For example, it is using its award-winning System 800xA Extended Automation platform to control a unique sand dune water filtration process for a leading Netherlands water company.
This eco-friendly production process uses coastal sand dunes to purify river water into drinking water for 1.2 million people. In South Africa ABB is committed to water conservation in its operations.
Its new energy-efficient head office, manufacturing and logistics centre in Longmeadow, Johannesburg, uses water efficiently. Rainwater harvesting feeds the indigenous gardens.
A grey-water recycling system further conserves water. Solar energy is used extensively to heat water, thus minimising its carbon footprint.
Find out more at www.abb.com/water